CCF #5

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Originally Posted by cpks It is quite clear that the Fathers are not speaking of two senses in which Jesus shed his blood. "For if we look at its value," the fathers say, "we must confess that the Redeemer shed His blood for the salvation of all; but if we look to the fruit which mankind have received from it, we shall easily find that it pertains not unto all, but to many of the human race." (Emphasis mine) Now it is clear from this that there are not two senses here of "shedding" or "blood", but rather two senses of "for". In the first sense, the "value" sense, Jesus shed his blood with the intention of or, perhaps better, for the enabling of, the salvation of all. In the second sense, of course, the fruit of the passion is to the benefit of many, but alas perhaps not all.

It appears to me that you are saying there are two senses in which Our Lord's words can be taken, based on two ways to take the word "for": (1) Jesus shed His blood for the enabling of the salvation of all, (2) Jesus shed His Blood to the benefit of many, but perhaps not all.

Those are essentially the two senses in which I was saying Our Lord's sacrifice can be spoken of: He died for the salvation of all and for the salvation of many. However, I am not sure how a variation in the meaning of the word "for" in Our Lord's words gets you to anything like your two sentences.

We can certainly both agree that "the Redeemer shed His blood for the salvation of all". That is straight from the Fathers. That is the value of His Passion. Notice, however, that when the Fathers are describing the value of His Passion, they do not reference His words at the Last Supper. His words, they say, "serve to declare the fruit and advantage of His Passion". Furthermore, "if we look to the fruit which mankind have received from it, we shall easily find that it pertains not unto all, but to many".

The Fathers say that these are the words of consecration:

This is the chalice of My blood, of the New and Eternal Testament, the Mystery of Faith, which shall be shed for you and for many to the remission of sins.

If Jesus said that "My blood...shall be shed...for many", it seems one either has to agree that His blood is shed for many, or believe that His words were incorrectly recorded, or believe that Jesus was mistaken about the purpose of His sacrifice.

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Originally Posted by cpks Imagine this scenario: A father is out walking with his children. A car veers out of control and mounts the pavement. In order to protect his children, he hurls himself into the path of the car. By this he saves the life of some, but not all, his children. Let's imagine that this is written up in the newspaper. Look at these two possible headlines: 1) Father gives his life for his children 2) Father gives his life for some of his children What does the second version suggest to you? To me it suggests that the father wanted to save the lives of some of his children, but not others.

If Christ's words shock you, that is a sign that you need to think more deeply about His words, not that the words need to be changed. [I need to think more deeply about His words, too].

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Originally Posted by cpks Now this is precisely the oddness about "for many". And this is my explanation for the difference between the fidelity to Latin words and the duty to bear witness to the truth, which comes a long way first in the liturgist's priorities.

Misrepresenting the words of Christ is a dereliction of duty to bear witness to the truth. It is hard to see how fidelity to the Latin words fails to bear witness to the truth, unless the words are wrong. If they are wrong, why shouldn't they be fixed? If they are right, why should they be changed?

And where is the evidence that the Latin words are wrong? Earlier, you cited oi polloi as the Greek phrase used in the New Testament to mean "the all who are many", but that phrase does not appear in Matthew 26 or Mark 14. Both of them opted simply for polloi, "many". Why should we assume Matthew and Mark got it wrong? Why should we assume that the creators of the New Mass got it wrong, and that the traditional Mass is wrong, and that the Divine Liturgies of St. Basil and St. John Chrysostom are wrong? Why should we assume that translators of possibly every English-language Bible available got it wrong? Why should we assume that the Doctors of the Church and the Fathers of the Church got it wrong?

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Originally Posted by cpks The so-called "faithful" translation is misleading, for exactly the same reason as (2) above is misleading, according to the interpretation put forward by the Fathers at Trent.

Why is (2) misleading? Because it won't make people think of (1)? The same can be said of (1) -- it won't make people think of (2). Are you saying the Church Fathers objected to (2)? They did not object to it, they insisted on it.

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Originally Posted by MichaelDunphy I am glad we can agree that there's no argument about the meaning of the Latin pro multis; the argument appears to be over whether pro multis belongs in the Latin Mass.

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Originally Posted by cpks Heavens, what am I supposed to be arguing now? All I thought I was arguing is that those who authorized the translation of "multis" as "all" were entitled to do so, (a) because a strict translation was misleading, and (b) because the translation is legitimate, given that "multis" itself represents a semitic idiom in which "many" can mean "all".

If "for many" does not belong in the English-language Mass because it is misleading, and "pro multis" is Latin for "for many", then wouldn't "pro multis" in the Latin-language Mass be misleading in the same way as "for many"? You did say [post #77] that no word in Latin has the alleged "all who are many" meaning. So shouldn't the Latin Mass (both old and new) be changed, too?

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Originally Posted by MichaelDunphy I looked up the verses in Isaiah 53 you mentioned; we have the same problem here as in Matthew and Mark. It is far from clear that rabbim in verses 11 and 12 should be taken to mean "all", and, in fact, it is consistently translated as "many" in all versions of the Bible that I have checked.

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Originally Posted by cpks Sorry, that just isn't true. See Is 53:6 and compare Is 53:11. The iniquities of "all" in v.6, and "many" in v.11. It isn't far from clear. (I don't allege that any translations should or do put "all" for "many" in vv. 11 and 12. I am not suggesting that bibles should be so translated as to disguise the idioms of the underlying language.) What I am offering here is a clear example of a case where the Hebrew for "many" is obviously not opposed to "all".

My interpretation:
v.6: We [almost] all sin, or at least are stained by original sin.
v.11&12 Many of us will win pardon for our offences because of the Sacrifice of Christ.

If you prefer to say that "all" will win pardon for their sins, I refer you again to Matthew 25:31-46. The number of verses refering to judgment could be multiplied, if you think I am placing undue weight on that single passage.

My interpretation has the advantage of assuming that Isaiah said "all" when he meant "all", and "many" when he meant "many".

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Originally Posted by cpks It is noteworthy that these quibbles about many/all tend to revolve around the theme of the atonement. That is why Is 53:11 is so important. If it can be shown, as it has been shown, that Is 53:11 is not incompatible with "all" (as 53:6 proves), then we can - and surely should - understand the "many" in these gospel passages as echoing Isaiah - the scripture that Jesus was to fulfill. Hence, that the evangelists used this semitic idiom was not a linguistic curiosity at all. It was a deliberate reference to the scripture that Jesus had come to fulfill.

Isaiah 53 does no more to prove that many means all in Hebrew than it does in English. The context provides the connection between "us all" in verse 6 and "many" in verses 11 and 12. Even if one reads Isaiah 53 the way you do, there is no need to posit a special Semitic idiom making many mean all;the context would provide the association. I wonder if perhaps literary constructs in the Bible, such as parallelism, contrast, and understatement, are the source of this special "all who are many" idiom claimed to have been recently discovered in Hebrew and Aramaic.

Of course, without the claim that many means all in Hebrew, Isaiah is open to other interpretations besides yours, such as the one I tentatively offered earlier.

As for the connection between the Gospel passages and Isaiah 53, changing "many" to "all" in the former but not the latter would would obscure the connection, rather than clarifying it.

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Originally Posted by cpks Finally, the question of biblical and liturgical translation is much more complex than just a matter of literalness. The task of the biblical translator is a very different one from that of the liturgist. While I have not the smallest inclination to defend ICEL against anything - nor Jeremias either! - I think that there are other, better criticisms of ICEL, whereas this one just doesn't have legs.

If liturgists believe it is their task to correct Holy Scripture, they are mistaken. Scripture and Tradition alike attest that Our Lord said His blood is shed "for many".

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"The consecration is accomplished by the words and expressions of the Lord Jesus. Because, by all the other words spoken, praise is rendered to God, prayer is put up for the people, for kings, and others; but when the time comes for perfecting the sacrament, the priest uses no longer his own words, but the words of Christ. Therefore, it is Christ's words that perfect this sacrament." (St. Ambrose, De Sacram. iv)